Chapter 6 – Contract Signed
“Assistant Manager Min Chaekyung?”
When Chaekyung didn’t respond, he called her again.
Hearing her name spoken in his low voice, Chaekyung widened her eyes and looked up at him. Kangwoo was holding out a stack of documents, his gaze cool and authoritative. She took the file he offered. Without a backward glance, he brushed past her and walked away.
Only then did Chaekyung release the breath she’d been holding.
“Assistant Manager Min, he really is handsome. Don’t you think?”
Woogyeong sidled up beside her, whispering in admiration.
“……”
“I get why you’re so startled.”
She seemed to think Chaekyung’s reaction was simply because of Kangwoo’s good looks.
He had clearly recognized her. There was no way he hadn’t. Yet when she thought about what lay ahead, her vision went dark. She bit her lip hard, but no matter how much she thought it through, there was no solution. The fact that he was now part of her direct line made the future feel especially bleak.
Even after returning to her desk, Chaekyung couldn’t focus on her work.
She kept zoning out, hands frozen mid-task.
The individual interviews for the newly established department moved quickly, and the employees who returned all seemed to be in decent spirits. As the interviews by rank drew closer, Chaekyung grew more and more tense.
Because the interviews were scheduled around the vice president’s calendar, they couldn’t all be finished in one day. That only made things worse. They said it was better to get it over with quickly, but the longer it dragged on, the more she overthought everything.
And finally, Chaekyung stood in front of the vice president’s office door, taking a deep breath.
Just as she was about to knock, the door swung open.
Startled, Chaekyung froze with her hand still raised, staring blankly up at Kangwoo.
He looked at her expressionlessly.
“Move.”
“Pardon? Ah—yes.”
He passed by her as she hurriedly stepped aside, handing some documents to his secretary. The way he headed toward his office was completely natural.
As Kangwoo entered the office, he didn’t look back.
“Aren’t you coming in?”
“Yes.”
Chaekyung snapped out of it, followed him inside, and closed the door. Before turning around, she took a shaky breath.
He was already seated, flipping through the documents piled high on his desk.
His office was stark, done entirely in black and white. Furnished with only the bare minimum, it felt almost empty—yet his presence alone filled the space completely.
Chaekyung walked up to stand in front of his desk, but even then, Kangwoo continued reviewing documents without saying a word.
His calm indifference, acting as if she didn’t even exist, made it even harder to breathe.
“Sit.”
“Yes.”
After calling her in only to ignore her, Kangwoo finally gestured toward the conference table. Chaekyung sat down, feeling like she was sitting on pins and needles. She seriously wondered if she should just quit the company.
Her mind was a mess, her thoughts running wild. The longer she was left sitting in the corner of his office, the more she struggled to untangle the knot in her head. Even the air in the room felt suffocating.
Then, just as she was trying to organize her thoughts, Kangwoo spoke—and everything became irreparably tangled.
“Min Chaekyung.”
“Yes!”
“That was your name. I should’ve asked that night.”
“……”
Chaekyung turned toward his desk, eyes wide. Why would someone bother asking the name of a one-night stand? Or explaining their own?
Leaning back in his executive chair, Kangwoo stared straight at her. He set down the fountain pen in his hand with a sharp click.
“If I’d known sooner, I wouldn’t have bothered with such a tedious interview.”
“……”
“Because of Min Chaekyung alone, I wasted two full hours of my packed schedule on eight team members. And I still have three more to sit through. How do you plan to compensate me?”
His tone made it clear the thought alone irritated him. His sharp gaze pierced into her.
Chaekyung frowned, unable to understand why this was somehow her fault.
“Why should I compensate you?”
She didn’t think she needed to back down. It had been a consensual one-night stand—she had nothing to be ashamed of.
Like a rat cornered into attacking a cat, being pushed into a corner only made Chaekyung bolder. At that point, she almost didn’t care anymore.
“Because the interviews started because of you.”
He walked over and sat across from her at the table. Leaning back, he rested his elbow on the armrest and rubbed his lips with his fingers. His deepened gaze studied her, as if measuring what to do with her.
Kangwoo curled his lips into a picture-perfect smile. Backlit by the sunlight pouring into the office, his refined face seemed even more dazzling.
Images overlapped in her mind, tormenting Chaekyung, who was still weak to that face.
“I don’t understand how this is my fault.”
“Really? Then I suppose it doesn’t matter.”
“What do you mean, Vice President?”
The vague, drifting conversation frustrated her. She couldn’t hide her expression, worried her thoughts might show no matter what.
“If you’re fine with me pointing you out in front of everyone, I can do that anytime.”
“Why are you doing this to me?”
Chaekyung asked seriously. She wanted to know his intentions, but being entangled with him scared her.
“You really don’t know why?”
“No. I don’t.”
Kangwoo stood and walked back to his desk. Then he placed eight 50,000-won bills on the table in front of her.
She recognized the money instantly—the cash he’d left behind in the suite.
“You let me have my first experience. I’ve never paid a woman before.”
“Paid…?”
“This is payment, isn’t it? What else would you call it?”
His voice was low and dry.
“That’s not what it was meant to be.”
“Then what was it?”
Even as she tried to explain, Kangwoo cut her off sharply.
“You went all the way to a suite with me, and it’s an expensive hotel.”
Saying it out loud made her feel embarrassed, but she had no choice.
He clearly misunderstood her actions.
“So?”
“That night was my proposal.”
“Which means only 400,000 won?”
“……”
Her face burned. She never imagined she’d be discussing something this explicit while sitting in an office.
Kangwoo crossed his arms and stared at her without blinking.
“Then we should calculate it properly.”
“Pardon? How—”
“Let’s call the 400,000 won a down payment.”
“What?”
“The L Hotel suite costs 8.2 million won per night. Can’t you do the math?”
“What are you saying…?”
“As you can see, I have more money than I could ever need. I’m not planning to take the remaining 7.8 million in cash.”
Her mouth went dry. The man who had once felt like a mirage now felt frighteningly real, and it made her chest sink.
“Then what… do you want instead?”
The first thing that came to mind was that night.
Don’t tell me he wants me to pay with my body…
The thought made her tense.
No matter how hard she tried to think of a way out, her mind was in chaos.
“What kind of thoughts are you having, turning red and breathing like that?”
Kangwoo mocked her.
“You turned me into a dog in heat that night, and now you’re doing it again?”
“That’s an awful way to put it.”
Forcing down the feeling of being exposed, Chaekyung met his gaze with a serious expression.
“You made me into the worst kind of man. So repay me another way.”
“What do you want?”
“Your time. Min Chaekyung’s time—whenever I want, wherever I want, doing whatever I want.”
When Chaekyung froze in shock, he added, the corner of his mouth lifting dangerously.
“Sex excluded.”
She didn’t understand.
“My time? Why would you need that?”
“That’s for me to decide.”
While Chaekyung stood there stunned by his twisted logic, Kangwoo slid a single sheet of paper toward her.
She stared blankly at the empty A4 page.
“A contract should be clear.”
“Do you really think this makes sense?”
“Why wouldn’t it?”
With an impatient sigh, Kangwoo leaned back and looked at her.
Whenever he watched her like that—unhurried, his gaze deliberately slow—she felt suffocated. And when his low voice filled the room, her entire body tensed.
“Do I need to spell it out?”
“……”
“The person who suggested the night should pay for the suite. Isn’t that right?”
He wasn’t wrong.
She had suggested the night and left the money behind. She had no argument.
Arguing with him would only get her further tangled in his logic.
“Then… there won’t be any unreasonable demands?”
She couldn’t bring herself to say sex out loud.
“Of course. If you don’t want to— I don’t have a hobby of forcing unwilling women.”
His words carried a strange aftertaste. Even so, there was no avoiding this.
Having made up her mind, Chaekyung straightened her back.
“Fine. Then I’ll write it.”
She hesitated, holding the blank paper, unsure where to begin. Kangwoo dictated the terms, phrasing them like a proper contract.
Chaekyung added a few clauses of her own, then carefully reviewed everything again.
“If you have any additional terms, Vice President, please review it and let me know.”
She handed him the paper, now formally titled a contract, in a businesslike manner.
Kangwoo read through it seriously. To an outsider, it would have looked like a standard business negotiation—their expressions were that grave.
Chaekyung still couldn’t quite believe she was entering into such a bizarre contract. Having to face him every day was uncomfortable enough; now she had to give him her time whenever he wanted.
After finishing her review, Chaekyung signed and passed it to him. Kangwoo signed immediately and picked up the paper.
“Do you want it notarized?”
“No.”
“Fine.”
He smiled coldly, the corner of his mouth lifting. Without thinking, Chaekyung found herself staring at his face.
She couldn’t tell whether what she felt was guilt, lingering affection, or the beginning of something else entirely.
As she bowed her head and turned to leave, his voice etched itself into her back.
“Wait quietly until I contact you.”
When she turned around, Kangwoo’s gaze tightened around her like a shackle.
